(Note: Commentaries do not necessarily represent ASPO-USA's positions; they are personal statements and observations by informed commentators.)

Back in 2001, I set out some timing benchmarks for energy developments that I saw coming towards us (“Nearing the Top of Hubbert’s Peak,” 8/1/01). These benchmarks have served me well over the succeeding six years in a general sense, but now I think that they need to be sharpened and tightened a bit. We are closing in on some of the dates cited for important defined events such as the peak of non-OPEC oil supply, projected then for 2010. I now believe that certain of these dates should be modified, in this case to 2008. The reasons here are more technical than fundamental. 

(Note: Commentaries do not necessarily represent ASPO-USA's positions; they are personal statements and observations by informed commentators.)

As noted in this newsletter on 12/24/07, "International Energy Agency and Energy Information Administration figures show that the plateau of global liquids production that began in 2005 recently ended due to a large production increase of 1.4 million b/d in September/October. This production increase has been sustained during October/November." It is our contention that it is too early to conclude that the world has broken out of plateau production.

(Note: Commentaries do not necessarily represent ASPO-USA's positions; they are personal statements and observations by informed commentators.)

Recently I heard a story about a drill crew in a distant land that performed a ritual on a rig floor. They poured the blood of a sacrificed goat down the hole to appease the "gods". Perhaps they thought that this would help get the drillstring free allowing them to drill ahead without further problems. You'd think that us Westerners would scoff at such desperation, but I knew exactly how that crew felt. Somehow it seems that some projects are at the mercy of the "Gods of the Rotary Table", as we sometimes say. Some wells can make even the most scientifically minded somewhat superstitious. It’s almost as though the gods are like those of the Greeks that often taunted and toyed with their hapless humans. If we were ancient Greeks, the drilling god would be Hades, god of the underworld provoking us with stuck pipe, loss of circulation, blowouts and the occasional sacrifice of life on the rig floor. We call these “wells from hell” for a reason.